The kick-off conference of the #ACCESS project took place in Košice on 14 September 2023. The event brought together more than 90 participants from the Slovak-Hungarian border region, including the representatives of local and regional municipalities, EGTCs, development agencies, universities, enterprises and citizens living alongside the border.
The #ACCESS project, officially titled as ‘Promotion of legal accessibility across the Slovak-Hungarian border’ is a strategic project of the INTERREG VI-A Hungary-Slovakia programme managed by CESCI and CESCI Carpathia with a purpose to systematically unfold and eliminate persisting legal and administrative obstacles along the shared border. The project started in May 2023 and it lasts for six years, until April 2029. The kick-off conference of the project was hosted by CESCI Carpathia.
At the beginning of the event, Dr. Ágota Hetey, Consul General of Hungary in Košice; Mr Rastislav Trnka, President of the Košice Self-governing Region; Mr Jaroslav Poláček, Mayor of the City of Košice; Ms Lea Malá, Director General of the Ministry of Investments, Regional Development and Informatisation of the Slovak Republic; Mr Miroslav Štrkolec, Dean of the Faculty of Law of the Pavol Jozef Šafárik University of Košice and Ms Katalin Júlia Pénzes, Desk Officer at the European Commission welcomed the audience. They pointed out the importance of the initiative from different perspectives, from the EU to the local level. At the same time, they also expressed their hope for the positive outcomes of the project which expectedly will improve the quality of life of the people living in the border region.
The first panel, moderated by Ms Katalin Fekete, Senior Legal Adviser of CESCI, was dedicated to the European context of the legal accessibility initiative. The EU level discourse on legal and administrative obstacles started in 2015 and since then, several efforts have been made to overcome them. Ms Katalin Júlia Pénzes introduced the financial, political, legal tools which are offered by the European Commission to support cross-border interactions. As an element of this tool-kit, Mr Martín Guillermo-Ramírez, Secretary General of the Association of European Border Regions briefly presented the so-called b-solutions initiative, managed by the AEBR. He highlighted the most important lessons learnt based on the 90 selected case studies from all over Europe which aimed to identify and resolve specific cross-border obstacles. Among others, he mentioned that there are no one-fits-all solutions, thus legal accessibility is a time-consuming procedure, which also needs political commitment at different governance levels. Last, but not least, Ms Csilla Veres, Head of Joint Secretariat of the Interreg VI-A Hungary-Slovakia Programme introduced the evolution of the projects funded by the Programme of 24-year long history. During the years, the rather simple, infrastructure-based developments have been partly replaced by more complex and integrated cooperation initiatives which pointed out the existence of some obstacles of legal and administrative nature.
The panel was followed by a round-table discussion on the already recognised barriers at the Slovak-Hungarian border. The speakers, Ms Nikoletta Horváth, Head of the Managing Authority of the Interreg VI-A Hungary-Slovakia programme, Ms Lea Malá, and Mr Péter Nagy, Director of the Ister-Granum EGTC shared their personal experiences and stories within the framework of a pleasant conversation. The moderator, Mr Gyula Ocskay, Secretary General of CESCI conveyed the message of a cross-border resident, Ms Zsuzsanna Pelech, who was not able to attend the conference, but has experienced many difficulties during her everyday commuting between Rajka and Bratislava. In the course of the talk, the audience were given several examples of obstacles concerning the field of employment and taxation, transport, health and (public) administration.
At the end of the event, the #ACCESS project, as a comprehensive tool for resolving such obstacles was presented by Ms Enikő Hüse-Nyerges, Senior Development Expert of CESCI, and Mr Rudolf Bauer, Director of CESCI Carpathia. They stressed that the project is continuing with the mapping of legal and administrative barriers, to which the contributions of the stakeholders from the border region are warmly welcomed.
The project is financially supported by the European Union,
within the framework of the Interreg Hungary – Slovakia Programme.
For more information visit www.skhu.eu.
The project is financially supported by the European Union,
within the framework of the Interreg Hungary – Slovakia Programme.
For more information visit www.skhu.eu.
#ACCESS: Survey
